384 Transactions. 



Diefienbach says that the kite was a sign of peace when it was seen 

 flying near a village. This may have been the case under ordinary circum- 

 stances, as it is obvious that kite-flying as a pastime would not have been 

 practised in time of trouble ; but I have it on the statement of Kapua, of 

 Purangi, in Taranaki, a recognized authority on old Maori matters, that a 

 kite was often flown over a fa when an enemy was on the war-path in the 

 neighbourhood. This was no doubt a special kite, which would be recog- 

 nized as a signal not only to give the alarm to the surrounding villages, but 

 to summon the various fighting-parties to a central rallying-point. 



I conclude with an anecdote relating how a kite was used as a signal, 

 related to me by Mr. James Bedggood, an old settler in the Bay of Islands. 

 Once upon a time a certain chief, who was already married, took to him- 

 self a second wife ; but, as might be expected, the two women could not 

 agree. Infatuated with his new wife, the chief took the old one secretly 

 av.'-ay in his canoe, and marooned her on an uninhabited island, where in 

 process of time she gave birth to a son. She was very badly of? for food, 

 and for a while she had to subsist on anything she could pick up on the 

 island. Walking along the shore one day, she happened on a kit of kumara 

 which had been washed up by the tide. "These she planted, and in due time 

 harvested the crop, when her condition was a little better. Meanwhile her 

 brothers, who had suspected all along that there was something crooked, 

 had been searching for her everywhere, but so far without success. One 

 day, however, they noticed a smoke rising from the island. They got out 

 their kite, and managed to fly it so as it would drop near the fire. The 

 woman recognized the kite, and made a bigger smoke as a sign that she had 

 seen and understood, when the brothers crossed over and rescued the mother 

 and child. Her husband wanted her to come back to him, saying that, 

 after all, he preferred her to the young wife ; but her brothers would not 

 consent to this tardy settlement, and took her away to live with themselves. 



The Maori kite has long been a thing of the past. Probably no Maori 

 now living has ever seen a real tnanuaute, and when Sir George Grey wanted 

 to obtain one many years ago he was obliged to get one specially made. 



In the evolution of modern Maori life there is no room for the manuaute. 

 Its place has been filled by other things. There is no occasion to send up 

 a kite to take a message to a neighbouring county when the post-office or 

 the telephone will do the business with much more ease and certainty. 

 Neither would it be worth while to take the matter out of the hands of the 

 police and hunt round with a kite for the body of a missing relative. As 

 an instrument for the acquisition of new lands it would be hardly required, 

 as the Maori of to-day is more anxious to dispose of the land he already 

 possesses than to exert himself to acquire any more. And the " great 

 games " : is not their place taken by the horse-race and the football match 

 and other pakeha diversions that delight the modern Maori ? Some day — 

 on the occasion of a Royal visit, perhaps — kite-flying may be revived once 

 more, like the haka and the poi dance ; but the revival, if it ever does 

 occur, will be but a temporary makeshift, a shadow of the past, for the 

 string is broken and the manuaute has long ago sailed away into oblivion. 



Hnere ra, manuaute! 

 (Farewell, Maori kite!) 



